Daily Archives: September 18, 2011

Today, even with all the technology in the world, we can’t really foretell the exact date and time of a volcano eruption. A single but small volcano eruption or few of them go berserk will not bring about any cataclysmic event. It’s a different story if a super volcano erupts. It’s the scary case for any place that has one of those super volcanoes. Yellowstone National Parks of Wyoming state has one of those super volcanoes which is somewhat active. It’s not active in a way that it goes berserk and explode and release magma and spew lava at rate which kills everything in sight, instead it is slowly building up as if one day everything nearby could be wiped out instantly by an eventual cataclysmic eruption; everything not so nearby might also be affected by the devastating side effects of having an eruption from a super volcano.

Obviously, people would die instantly if they are so near to the eruption of a super volcano. The people who are not so near but near enough would be killed by pyroclastic flow. The flow would move so fast that it would swallow up an entire city easily, and people who live in such an area will be suffocated by the heat of pyroclastic flow. Too much of pyroclastic flow can bury an entire city, and Pompeii is a perfect example of how a past city got buried underneath the volcanic ashes. A video right after this paragraph suggests that if a Yellowstone volcano erupts, everything within 60 miles will be destroyed instantly, but that is only the beginning. What comes after is the unprecedented amount of deadly particles (i.e., volcanic ash) to be thrown up 15 miles above the atmospheres and then fall back down to earth to affect about half of the United States. The astounding size of volcanic ash can endanger all active flights of airplanes and clog up cars and force rooftops to collapse and so on.

Although Yellowstone is promoting as a national park, it’s a volcano! The videos right after this paragraph explain more of Yellowstone and why there is an observatory of Yellowstone and what dangers would arise if an eruption of Yellowstone will occur again, because according to Discover Channel’s article “America’s Explosive Park“, an eruption of Yellowstone had occurred around 640,000 years ago and ejected 8,000 times of ash and lava of Mount St. Helens.

So, why are we so interested in the topic of Yellowstone and its potential for creating a cataclysmic event? It’s because of the newest yet episode of Curiosity of Discovery Channel which will air tonight at 8:00 PM ET/PT has Samuel L. Jackson as a narrator for the topic of how Earth will be destroyed, and in this episode Samuel L. Jackson will talk how a major Yellowstone eruption can destroy America. The preview of this newest yet episode of Curiosity can be watched right after this paragraph.

So, let backtrack a bit. Even though we know that before a major eruption of any volcano, there will be signs of frequent small earthquakes and nearby earth vibrations. Nonetheless, such signs cannot tell the scientists for sure that there will be a major eruption of a volcano, because it’s all depending on how much more magma needs to be built up inside a volcano. When enough magma pressure has built up inside a volcano, the volcano erupts and releases such pressure.

I might be wrong about the following. I think unless the scientists can measure and know the exact measurement of the magma’s built-up pressure before any volcanic eruption will occur, or else we just have to assume about when a volcano will most likely to erupt. I don’t think it’s possible to know exact measurement of such volcanic pressure, because each volcano has its own personality such as shape and size and earth compositions; but I could be wrong! I guess technology can only do so much (i.e., assuming what will happen) when it comes to a volcanic eruption.